Hi - not sure if anyone there. I was wondering what this means -- "Brazil 18of 1966." The 18th biggest song of 1966 (sic)? It comes from the reference for
the Rolling Stones' Satisfaction in 1965. I am trying to find its Brazil chart
peak.

"The 18th biggest song of 1966 in Brazil" according to the chart listed on the
"Song Charts" page. If you want to find when it peaked in Brazil follow the links on that page.

14 Jan 2014

#41

the right name of the artist is
Hervé Vilard

We deliberately do not employ characters with accents, the sources are inconsistent and
liable to get confused. We realise that this is a very Anglocentric view but it is the
easiest way to ensure consistency.

So thanks for the correction, but we are not going to change the data

14 Jan 2014

#94

right name is
BILLY JOE ROYAL

That looks correct, the data has been changed, thanks for the suggestion

23 Jul 2013

song from the 1965

The song is " may I ". Can't remember who did it.

We have fours songs that we think it could be:

Bill Deal & The Rhondels had a hit called "May I", but that was 1969.
1910 Fruitgum Co had "May I Take A Giant Step (Into Your Heart)" in 1968.
Malcolm Roberts had "May I Have the Next Dream With You" also in 1968.
Sam & Dave had "May I Baby" in 1967.

24 May 2013

Re: Song Year

'Market size' is very much aligned proportionately to population in Europe and the US...

Yes, you should apply the country of origin according to its earliest release date in that
country...

No, market size doesn't correlate very well with population or GDP, that's why we use it as
a guide.

If we tell you something is difficult (and stupid) and that we're not going to do it you have
two choices, either put up your own version to prove us wrong (we've even made the data available
for you) or shut up. Keeping on telling us what we "should do" doesn't help anyone.

We look forward to reading your results

28 Apr 2013

Re: Song Year

Your method is giving the same weighting to countries with vastly different
population sizes. In the case of 'Keep Searching' (We'll Follow The Sun)' this
means that Norway is given the same significance as US in your 'median'
methodology for assigning it to 1965. Even with the combination of the other
'1965' countries, your readership is going to be greater in the US and Canada
combined, thereby demonstrating a flaw in your 'more readers' logic.

Also, you are not including all countries where a song charted. For example
with 'Keep Searching', this song charted in Australia at the end of 1964.
Therefore, you do not have all observations to determine the 'median'
internationally.

Therefore, once again, I suggest that the most appropriate way to assign ayear to a song is according to the chart year of its country of origin - 'I'm
Telling You Now' in 1963 (UK) and 'Keep Searching' in 1964 (US) etc. This will
better show the 'sounds' of a given year while also meaning more to your
readership in terms of when their own country's songs charted.

Population of countries has nothing to do with it, if it did India
and China would dominate. We base our calculations on market size.
Norway is much smaller than the US, that is exactly why there is one
song chart from Norway and (for this song) 7 from the US. So Norway
is not given the same significance as the US, CashBox is given the same
significance as WABC NY, Norway gets the same impact as Record World.

Of course we can only include dates from charts that we have, the fact
that this was a hit in Australia in a chart we have no data for cannot
influence the year we assign.

Apart from those minor issue there are two different problems with your
argument, first of all the song "Keep Searchin' (We'll Follow the Sun)" is
not "clearly" from 1964. Not only did some US charts assign it to 1965
(such as the CashBox one), not only did the song spend significant parts
of its US chart run in 1965, but also the North American market for music is
about the same size as the combined European one and every country in
Europe has it in 1965.

But, even if we agreed that this song "should" be assigned to 1964, how
could we implement that? We have to process more than 30,000 song artists,
are you suggesting we should assign each one a country of origin? How long
do you think it would take to work that out (where does "Fleetwood Mac" come
from, for example)? Even if every artist was assigned a country how would
you set the years for hits that were not hits there? What if an artist came
from a country without a chart? Your suggestion just leads to a whole
load of questions.

The median year approach is not perfect, we can agree with you there, but
it is "good enough" in most cases, it relies only on the data within the
charts (no additional unreliable source of data is needed) and it is implementable within
the constraints of available effort.

Until someone can suggest an alternate approach that is feasible we'll
stay with this one.

4 Mar 2013

Re: Song Year

How do you apply the logic of a 'median' year to a song that charted in only
1963 and 1965 according to your list? In the case of 'I'm Telling You Now',
1965 is the latest year, not the median. Therefore, are you referring to the
'mode'? - i.e. where the greatest population is (heavily influenced by the US
population)? If so, it would appear that 'Keep Searchin' (We'll Follow The
Sun)' by Del Shannon should be listed in 1964 because it was in the US charts
in that year (also in Canada) which would outweigh the population in the
European countries. Your methodology appears to be inconsistent.

In the 60s, music changed rapidly and, even between 1963 and 1965, a song like
'I'm Telling You Now' clearly has a 1963 sound. It does not fit into the more
sophisticated sounds of 1965.
P.S. Your first reply sounds very autocratic rather than in readership
interest. It will be interesting to see if you print this response and reply
in a more empathetic tone...

The definition of "median" is the value that seperates the higher
half of values from the lower one. If there are an even number of values
the median is not defined, in that case the median is normally defined
as the average of the two surrounding values. However, for our purpose
taking the average of the values would be less valid than just using
one of them, so we define the value as the lower of the two.

In the case of "I'm Telling You Now" it has 4 entries for 1963 and
10 for 1965. Clearly the median of this range is 1965.

As we have said the way scores and years are assigned is precisely
defined. There is no later "adjustment", no tweaking because the
1960s were special, no promoting particular acts because they were
"significant", no placing a song in the position it "deserves".
Our methodology is forced to be consistent by the way we
process the source data. This ensures that the results are
solely based on the input charts.

We don't certainly don't agree that 'I'm Telling You Now' "clearly"
has a '1963 sound', and we think that more readers (being US based)
would disagree anyway. But the whole point is that even if we did
agree the rules of the site mean we wouldn't be allowed to
do anything about it.

If you can define a better way to automatically assign a year
we would be interested to hear about it. If your best suggestion
is that individual songs be assigned years according to
personal review we obviously can't implement that.

23 Feb 2013

Song Year

I suggest that each song be listed under the year of its first chart entry.
For example, I'm Telling You Now by Freddie & The Dreamers first charted in
the band's home country, the UK, in 1963. For many, it is clearly a 1963
record and does not belong in 1965 just because in got to No 1 in the US in
that year (two years after its recording and release).

As we have explained on the "Why is the year for XXX listed as 19XX?" FAQ
our decision is that we use the median year, not the earliest.

We are based in the UK, so we would also see "I'm Telling You Now" as a
1963 song. However, the simple fact is that far more of our readers
live in countries where the song was a hit in 1965.

So, no, we'll carry on using the median date.

25 Nov 2011

I heard Nirvana, the 1960s band on Radio Caroline on Tuesday night they did a
record which I think was called What to when your gone, I could be wrong with the
title, it was out just after or just before Pentocost Hotel. Any idea what it is called?

Many Thanks

The only two hits we have listed for the 1960s group Nirvana were
"Pentecost Hotel" and "Rainbow Chaser".

3 Jan 2011

"Them" band

According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Them_(band)
it seems the song "Them - Here Comes the Night"
should rank better than "Them - Gloria"

Please double check. Thanks.

Happy New year.

The song "Here Comes the Night" reached number 2 in the UK and number 24 in the US 'Billboard' chart.

The song "Gloria" didn't get into the UK chart and only reached number 71 in the Billboard one,
however it was inducted to the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999, was 94th on the "Acclaimed Music" chart
and was 208th on the Rolling Stone 500.

The extra achievements are why "Gloria" is rated higher than "Here Comes the Night".